The EU has only paid out a fraction of the money it says it has committed for green technologies, as companies spend up to 3,000 hours and an average €85,000 to access funds from a flagship programme.
Of €7.1bn awarded from the bloc’s Innovation Fund since it was established in 2021, only 4.7 per cent has been paid out to companies because of the red tape required to access the money, according to European Commission figures.
The application process is also extremely lengthy and bureaucratic. In an internal presentation this month, seen by the Financial Times, the commission said that 77 per cent of those seeking funding had to subcontract parts of the application process to consultants because of the “high burden”.
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